The real State of the Union
The Bizarro World illogic started right off the bat when George W. Bush intoned that what we need more of in public life is "a civil tone." This from a man who has repeatedly impugned the patriotism of his opponents, and just the previous week declared that critics of the Iraq war are giving "comfort to our enemies." That the president of "the United States of Amnesia" – as Gore Vidal puts it – doesn't remember what he says from one week to the next is not at all surprising. What's astonishing, however, is that we accept as normal behavior what, in a different (and better) era, would have been considered evidence of madness.

The megalomaniacs who rule us have no compunctions about the brazenness of their lies: they don't care how it looks, how it sounds, or even, in the end, how it sells. They know what they want, and they are single-minded in going after it. The message came through loud and clear in the president's State of the Union speech: prepare for perpetual war.